Subterfuge
by luechesie
Summary: After being captured during a rebel rally in her village, Clover is taken to Galbatorix himself and is appointed to Durza as a servant. What starts out as fear turns into something more as she takes an interest into releasing the spirits possessing him. Durza x OC. The Inheritence Cycle belongs to Christopher Paolini. I own nothing except for my OC.
1. Chapter 1

When at last she was allowed release, the sun had set far past the horizon and had bid its goodbyes for the night. Her stomach clawed and gurgled for some form of sustenance, but Clover denied all of the provisions that the guard had given her—not even a bite of the half loaf of bread nor a tiny sip of the water. She would _not_ take anything given to her...to do so would symbolize her acceptance of her imprisonment, and she wasn't planning on staying in the king's castle for very long.

It was king Galbatorix himself who had requested her presence in his court that night, when her eyes were tired and had grown bleary, and her body ached for respite, and Clover agreed to go with the guard from her cell up to the second floor, where she was to have an audience with his Majesty.

Even if it went against every fiber of her being to do so.

The guard who shuffled grudgingly ahead of her was a thickset man with grimy brown curls and flesh almost rotting with the amount of sweat and dirt coating it. He almost panted with each step, jerking the silver chain that clipped to her hands—bound in cuffs of a similar metal—almost on a whim, stopping every few moments to tug fiercely enough to send her stumbling forward. Clover kept her eyes on the greasy stone walls, scanning each tiny pillar of light that came from upstairs, taking care to memorize everything she could. She needed options if she were to escape soon, needed to know where every exit was. And the guard was enjoying pulling her forward every now and then a little too much, a filthy smile marking his dark face. She could hear the friction of his leather armor between his legs as he walked, could smell the foul odors reeking off of his skin and hair; but she said nothing while they came down the tunnel.

"The king said he had something of a surprise for you, girlie," said the guard, and Clover averted his eyes as he flashed her a grin of rock-like teeth, ground and yellowed from...well, she didn't want to spend too much of her time dwelling on thoughts of the guard's hygiene issues. "Don't know what it is, but he said you might like it better than what you have now...whatever that means."

A surprise? For her? What could king Galbatorix possibly give to her, not that anything he _could_ give would hold anything of value to her, his prisoner? She was the captured rebel that had been striking up hundreds of people into a full-blown rebellion, catching attention in pubs and standing on tables of bars, pressing close to groups of strangers to whisper her complaints and messages of a better way of life for them. They were practically enemies now, since she had said so many things against him, and with the level of hatred crossing inside of her chest for him, she could only wonder what it was that he had for her.

Perhaps it was a job as a lover—no, that was something she could never be, for she abhorred the thought of even being in his presence; someone to polish his dragon's scales whenever he wanted, or a keeper otherwise; a maid to fold his robes and tend to his soldiers and guards...no. She could not possibly be reduced to any of that, with her background in...well, everything else.

Or perhaps he was going to kill her, feed her to his precious Shruiken as a treat, or use her as a subject on some new torture device. But then again...Galbatorix was a magician, and a skilled one at that—he could torture people himself without the use of tools of torture devices. Then...why would he waste a spell on her, a simple girl whom had been unfortunate enough to be caught by three soldiers after being the cause of death for a hundred others?

"You will show him the utmost respect, girlie, or it's back to the dungeons with you."

The raspy growl of the guard's voice interrupted Clover from her thoughts, and as she recollected herself, she realized where she was. The room made her own house seem miniscule in comparison, with walls of gold that spread out with wide arms, sconces set beside torches, a grand chandelier dripping strings of diamonds and various other jewels that Clover couldn't quite place. Enormous windows twice the size of the ones in the largest pub matched each other on the far side of the room, revealing a blue, almost black sky that loomed beyond the spidery branches of trees the color of white smoke and ash. Beneath her lay the finest rug she had ever seen, an ornate silken piece that rolled out from the door a few yards behind her and the guard and ended just before it reached a set of tiny, pristine golden steps. One...two...three? There were only three steps in the set before they flattened out to a second platform, repeating until they stopped abruptly at the leather buckled boots of Galbatorix himself, his eyes glowing darkly in the center of his lowered head.

"Ah, at last I can gaze upon the face of the lady who rebels against me," said Galbatorix, and Clover took in the sight of him. His black hair swept over his coppery flesh like a raven, and his eyes resembled the regarding stare of a soaring bird of prey; his robes were also dark, and defined his broad shoulders nicely; a cape was fastened around his throat, several jeweled rings on his fingers, a gold band around his smallest finger. A trim beard and mustache outlined his lips, and there was an earring in his left ear, a tiny spike that was almost unnoticeable.

Clover shook off the guard, who was holding her by her harness rather close to her waist, his hand dangerously near her rear, and stepped forward. "And finally I can see the coward who gives us reason to rebel."

"Oi!" The guard jerked her back, his meaty hand pressing on her shoulder, his free hand tightening his hold on the metal cuffs. "I said respect his Majesty, or you'll be sleeping in the dungeons for a week!"

But Galbatorix raised a hand, undeterred; the black holes he called eyes never leaving Clover. "No, no; let her speak."

Clover paused a moment, her face sullen. He was letting her speak? It was hard not to let a sliver of a smile creep to her face, but she quickly suppressed it—she didn't understand Galbatorix, and perhaps by showing her little moment of triumph, she was only making matters worse for herself. The hulk of a guard harrumphed, but let go of her, now holding her out like a sheep to the slaughter.

"And what reason is this?"

She ran her tongue along her lips, and then said, "Because you have killed so many of us, your Majesty"—she said the word almost like an insult—"and hundreds, perhaps thousands of people have suffered at your hands. Your soldiers go through villages, plundering houses, catching rebels, and forcing young men to become a part of your troops. Anyone opposed to your reign is automatically silenced. Killed. Your control over us is only because of your own selfish ways...nobody seems to remember how you rose to power. You killed and cheated, and you forced your way up. And now, as you search for Eragon...you put all of us in danger. Over what—a simple dragon egg? If it wasn't meant to be yours, then it wasn't meant to be yours, Galbatorix. It wasn't meant to hatch for you. If this reign of stupidity and useless violence is simply in anger, then you are only killing your people with spite. Find him if you must, but for heaven's sake, let us innocents continue with our lives. Let us be safe, or at least not have to worry or fear about what our king will do to us next."

The room fell into utter silence for a long moment, and Clover wondered if in the next she were to be killed. Even with the lack of Shruiken in the room, it would take a simple thought from the king to call the mighty dragon to end her right then and there. A simple thought. It could be as small as a single word—eat; or perhaps the king would show his dragon an image of where he was, of who _she_ was, of what he wanted from her, or wanted done to her...

...or perhaps the beast already knew everything, or had suggested her death itself. Perhaps it already knew what the king was thinking as he sat in his great throne, his brow raised, his eyes dark and beady as ever. His hand curled and uncurled ringed fingers on the armrest while he stroked his beard, appearing to be thinking deeply. And perhaps he was. After all, she _had_ said quite a mouthful, and all of it had been cursing his power, his reign. His everything. At least she had spared the words about his dragon. Those grounds she knew well enough not to trespass on—a Rider and his dragon. They were on and the same, apart and somehow different. And that was _not_ the way that she wanted to die, being eaten or cursed because she had muttered some insolence about the king's loyal dragon.

But the guard had his own idea of things. "Shall I take her back to the dungeons, my king, and kill her there? Or will right here be suitable?"

The king said nothing as the guard held a jagged knife to the rebel's throat, his rancid breath in her face. As the moment of nothingness subsided, Clover felt the pressure of the blade against her neck, already drawing blood. Somehow she stayed calm, though her heart was racing—surely the king would kill her now. She wondered why she had even dared to say such things...and yet...they needed to be said. If she was to die anyway, why not her? Nobody else would have had the tenacity to stand up to Galbatorix like that...never in a million years, unless they had magic themselves, and even then...

No. She held no regret for her words. The only regret that she felt was the pang of guilt for not taking better care of her sisters, the two girls left behind in the village an infinite amount of miles away. Both unable to look after each other or provide means to survive...Clover was the one who had been their surrogate mother after their parents had been killed a number of years ago by Galbatorix's soldiers, and now with the two on their own...she could only see their faces as she closed her eyes and waited for the slitting of her own throat.

She relaxed her entire body. She could do this.

"Release her, Maddox."

Her eyes opened wide in disbelief. No, it was real—Galbatorix was rising from his throne, twisting a gold ring on his finger as he did so. "You heard me, did you not?" he said, and now his tone was harsh. The guard blinked several times before fumbling to free the rebel from the silver bonds clasped around her, hurriedly replacing his knife and shoving her forward.

The guard knew better than to go against the king's wishes.

"Come here, child."

Why Galbatorix was calling her a child, she couldn't say, for the king couldn't be any older than thirty...thirty-five? His age was hard to place, but still she obeyed his orders, feeling a touch of relief, a tiny sliver of...was that _gratitude?_ No. She wouldn't feel anything but hatred for this man, this coward, this...evil magician who was killing everyone in Alagaesia, who had killed her parents and separated their family. She was going to escape as soon as his back was turned, and she was going to start a revolution, a rebellion so large that no magician could stop them. Not even Galbatorix, as sly and cunning as he was. But Clover could be sly and cunning, too, and she would be. Her life depended on it.

The king was much taller than he looked, though he was only half a head taller than she was, and the black of his eyes was intensified by twelve up close. She could almost touch him, could reach out and knock the rings off of his fingers one by one, could grip him by the throat of his cape and strangle him...with a clean punch, she could knock him out. But she knew better than to assume something as simple as a punch or kick could injure this man, and her knowledge was verified as she stopped three feet from him. A strange aura surrounded him, like an invisible shield coating his body, impenetrable and daunting; his eyes seemed to dance before her, daring her to try and hit him, to strike him. But she wouldn't. She needed magic to kill this man, and magic was the one thing she didn't have—magic, and now she didn't have her sisters, wherever they were now...wherever _she_ was now. The king's castle was far enough away from her village that she didn't know the distance...only that it was a great journey to get inside or near it unless one wanted to be spotted, taken, or killed by soldiers and guards.

There was a cold air about him, too...a darkness that she couldn't identify. She wasn't familiar with magic, but she knew faintly what it felt like to be in the presence of it. And Galbatorix oozed..._dripped_ magic, so much that she almost didn't dare breathe before him.

"What is your name, rebel?" asked Galbatorix. His voice was strong, full of power that she still was feigning as he looked her over. Clover stopped for a moment—it didn't seem like lying to him would do any good, and if the truth had gotten her THIS far...and it was only her name.

"Clover," she said.

"Clover," he repeated, testing how the name sounded on his lips. He raised a brow. "That's a man's name. Have you lied to me, or is that your given name?"

She frowned. What did it matter to him what her name was? "No, that's what my parents named me."

"And your parents, are they still alive?"

She turned and saw that the guard, Maddox, had long since scuttled back into the dungeons, and had shut the door on his way out. It was just Galbatorix and her left in the room. She shook her head, and looked straight into his black, black eyes. "You killed them."

He nodded and pulled his lips into a straight line. A strange sensation swept through her body, a light tickle at first, but then a probe, like an enormous finger digging into her head...scraping her brain. She saw the faces of her sisters, of her parents years ago, of her home in the village now—

"Stop it!" she cried, stepping back. There was no way that Galbatorix was going to enter her mind, not for all the money in all of Alagaesia, not for her freedom...not for anything. "What do you want me for?"

"You have sisters," the king noted. "Interesting. And you can feel magic...and detect when it is doing something...also interesting. Many people do not know when their minds are being invaded, only that they are reliving certain memories or experiencing a rather unfortunate ailment or particularly nasty headache. Congratulations, you have proved yourself useful to me."

Clover clutched her head, her eyes wide with horror, the aura of calm she had summoned before slipping away in an instant. She slowly moved back from the king, feeling a throbbing in her head and a foreign feeling in her stomach and heart. It felt like hatred, and guilt and sorrow all at once...she had been _violated_ by this man; he had just gone inside of her head without even asking—

"What," she repeatedly slowly, "Do you _want_ with me?"

"Oh, many things, but we will get to that in time. Most rebels who are captured like this are killed long before they come to see me. They don't even get to try their luck at a memory search. You, my dear," he reached out and tapped her nose. Clover stared at his long ringed finger before returning her glare to his eyes. "Are special."

And then Galbatorix reached out again with his hand and gripped her beneath her chin, tilting her head up to look at him. She could make out the beautiful tapestry handing above the throne before images swam around her head, images that were like memories...someone else's memories. But they weren't memories at all, she realized as her eyes closed for a second time; they were thoughts that Galbatorix was sending her way. It was like a speech, a lengthy speech condensed into a matter of images.

She saw Galbatorix standing in a different room, a room with blank stone walls and a few torches on the wall, another beautiful tapestry gracing the space with its presence. There was another man that he was conversing with, a man with crimson hair falling in a straight plunge down his back, letting his maroon eyes steal the focus of his white face. Strange symbols were inked on his seemingly bare forehead, in light and faded streaks of every color, mostly tan and orange and brown waves sprouting foreign messages above his sharp, angled brows. Somehow, Clover found herself memorizing every feature of this man, noticing every nuance and slight that he possessed. Was something important about him? There was a heavy emphasis on the other man as the image played, crossing into new images that showed that man in a new room lined with clay shelves, bent over an enormous metal kettle. He wore a cape that matched his eyes, and had a slim build; his arms were muscled like an athlete as he reached out and tipped the contents of a jar into the large pot. He wasn't ugly, she thought, but there was something different about him, a sense that she could feel from the images Galbatorix was showing her that he was like the king. He was...magical. But there was something far darker about this red haired man than the king, as hard as it was to believe...

He was a Shade, she came to realized. This was Durza, a...friend of the king's, who did his bidding and used dark magic to have his way. Soldier feared him, villagers and other innocents died at a single twitch of his hand, and he was, in a word, deadly. Deadly and violent, a force to be reckoned with. This man was dangerous, and he killed for fun. There was no mercy inside of his cold, maroon eyes, not a single glimmer of hope for those who crossed him. She watched through the tinted glasses of foreign images as Durza whispered words and a roaring blaze erupted through a clearing in the woods, tearing down everything and engulfing anything that crossed his path. Another image: villages being overrun with soldiers, people screaming, praying and pleading, _begging_ for mercy, to be spared...Durza smiled a vicious snakelike smile and blasted them with a whirl of darkness, some of them falling to the ground without another sound before the blast hit their bodies. Some of them outside stumbling and dying within seconds of being yards from the Shade's presence.

There was some kind of message underlying in the images, like a voice speaking to her. More images meant more understanding. And now Clover understood.

This was Durza, a Shade. A killing machine. A monster. A ruthless man possessed by dark forces. And she was to tend to him, to be his sort of handmaid, to be his servant. His _loyal _servant, as was emphasized by Galbatorix, who would do whatever he wanted her to do, to serve him. She was to become an entirely new person, an individual much different than who she had been before being captured by his soldiers. She was to become someone else, and never go back. She would stay in the castle forever and ever, for eternity or until she died, and would serve Durza, and if she ran away, the price was death. And not just _her_ death—

"The death of your sisters would be a tragic thing, yes?" asked Galbatorix, examining his fingers as if he hadn't just shown the rebel all of this. Clover scrambled back into reality with a sharp gasp, tears threatening to fall from her eyes. "Your name is now Diana. You will serve only Durza and myself if I require any services...but do not get excited...I have servants of my own. He is expected to arrive sometime tomorrow, and until then, you will wait in the dungeon until I call upon you again."

Clover looked at the king, trying to absorb the tears back into her eyes. She would _not_ show weakness, would not cry in front of the king. Galbatorix had humiliated her enough, and she would not give him the satisfaction of seeing his efforts pay off. Why he wanted her as a servant when she would make a much more handsome coat or meal for Shruiken was beyond her, but she simply nodded and turned away from him.

"And do not try and run, rebel, because I will find you. And you will die."

His last words fell against her back like a sheet of ice, each one stabbing her heart with utter pain and fear as she fluttered down the steps and almost ran out of the throne room and into the hallway, back in the direction of the dungeons downstairs.

—

That night she could barely sleep; only toss from side to side on the bench chained to the wall as time crept on. She finally surrendered to the rumbling of her stomach, since she hadn't eaten before going to her small rally at the pub before she was captured. How long she had been inside the castle, she couldn't say; she remembered being bound with ropes and tossed into the back of a carriage, the bumping of rocks on the road, the jostling of the horses and the fluttering of their manes. But she couldn't place how long it had been since her capturing, so she flipped over on the wooden plank again and sighed, reaching for the tray where the half loaf of bread rested by the pitcher of water.

Well, if she was going to be here for a while...and the bread tasted so sweet between her lips, so thick and lush...she downed another bite with a swig of water, which wasn't as good as the bread, but satisfied her thirst.

This time tomorrow, she would be in the service of Durza, the Shade that the king had been so gracious to show her among the images in his head. Serving, cleaning, sweeping, folding, cooking, and perhaps kissing...Galbatorix had said that she was to do _whatever_ it was that the Shade wanted...but if it came down to any of that, she would run. She didn't care that she would be killed within seconds of fleeing—she wasn't going to sit around and become another one of the castle's love-slaves. She had things to do, sisters to take care of, and people to rally into a rebellion. Even if the king was beginning to strike the smallest amount of fear into her heart—she wasn't going to do whatever he said. Now that she was alone and away from the intimidation, she could think clearly without having to worry about masking her emotions. Galbatorix couldn't influence her here, and she wouldn't let him tomorrow. Whatever it was he wanted from her, he wouldn't be having anytime soon...or ever, if Clover had her way.

The hour was impossible to discern from looking around her cell in the dreary dungeon, and Clover had finished the loaf of bread, leaving most of the water in the pitcher. She supposed that she should have rationed out the food for the next few days, as she didn't quite know when it would be coming again, but she didn't care. Her belly was full, and she was as happy as a prisoner could be. She stood and walked around in the tiny confines of her cell, barely three yards across, unable to see much in the low light of her prison. It smelled of blood and urine everywhere, and of rotting flesh. It was all most unpleasant, and she didn't know if she had been anywhere worse in her entire life.

"I should wonder why you never married," said a voice, and with a start, Clover turned her attention to the guard nearest to her cell, the only one left in the dungeons. This one had a kinder voice, and a rougher build to him; unlike Maddox he was quiet and didn't try and croon and probe his fingers through the bars in the door of her cell, and that alone was enough to gain favor with her.

"Excuse me?"

The guard moved over to the door, where she could see a pair of blue eyes in the darkness—gentle blue eyes that bore her no ill will. "I mean, a pretty girl like you, at your age...you weren't wearing a ring when they caught you, so I assumed you weren't married to anyone."

She probably didn't look as pretty now, with her hair tangled from tossing back and forth on the bench and her face smeared with dirt. There was a faint line on her throat from where Maddox's blade had caressed her skin, and she touched it now, almost nervously as she spoke to the guard. "Nobody ever asked me," she said. "I suppose if a gentleman had asked me, I would be married by now. But I had people to take care of—I still do."

The guard raised a brow. "Who?"

Clover shook her head in the gloom. "It doesn't matter now. I left them behind when I was captured. You're not like Maddox—why is that? Are you the only one who guards at this hour?"

"Maddox only has one thing in mind when we capture girls like you. Even when we don't bring them to the castle—and you're about the first one we've bothered to take to Galbatorix—he still usually has his way with them." The guard shivered. "It's hideous—_he's _hideous. I'm not like him because...well, I didn't choose to serve here with the king; the soldiers came and took me away from my family, almost nine years ago today. I'm just here until I can get released back to my city...I've never liked killing or torturing, anyway, so I just do whatever I can to stay out of it."

"I've been so accustomed to violence these past few years that I hardly even notice it anymore," said Clover, and then she thought of something. "Do you have the time?"

"My shift starts at daybreak, and I've been down here for an hour or so."

"It's already morning?"

"Time passes quickly down here, I know," said the guard, and then he sighed. "You haven't slept, have you? You sound tired."

Clover sat on the wooden bench that was too small to be a real bed and rested her head in her hands. "I am. I'm supposed to meet a Shade tomorrow—ah, today, I guess."

"You're meeting _Durza?_" the guard cried incredulously, his eyes wide behind the bars of the door. "The _Shade?_ Are you being sent to get killed?"

"I'm going to be his servant."

She raised her head and looked at him with sad caramel colored eyes, barely able to see him through the dirty gloom of the dungeons. Saying it made it seem much more final, much more...real, as if it were actually going to happen. And it _was_, now that she thought about it. Where was she going to run to when she was in the presence of a Shade? She had seen what he could do, had seen the people he had killed without a second thought. Just a few words—that was all it took. And then they were gone.

"I'm...sorry," said the guard. "I didn't know what Galbatorix had planned for you-he rarely shares his plans with any of us. I understand where you're coming from, if it makes you feel any better-I know a little of what it's like to be away from home, in a strange place serving someone you don't want to or don't even like."

She heard the clinking of metal against metal, and recognized the sound as keys rustling against one another on a large ring. The guard sighed again, and turned to leave.

"My name's Marcus, by the way," he said quietly over his shoulder. "Marcus Livingston. And you have a few hours left before they bring you food and take you out if you wanted to sleep. I find that thinking of someplace quiet and happy-someplace away from all of this-helps."

And with that, the guard shuffled off-much quieter than Maddox, with steady breaths instead of labored ones-and Clover was left to herself. Silence filled the dungeons, broken only by the trickle of water from the cracks in the ceiling, pooling drop by drop in the corner of the stone hallway. She lay back on the bench and turned towards the wall, curling up as tightly as she could in an effort to get comfortable, and drifted off to sleep with thoughts of warm hills and beaches floating in her head.


	2. Chapter 2

The next morning was different.

Between the late hours of the night and the wee hours of morning, somehow Clover had been able to steal a little sleep, as fitful as it was. She was awakened by the clanging of keys against metal as a guard opened the door of her cell, slid the tray of food on the floor, and promptly shut it. She couldn't tell what time it was since there were absolutely no visible indicators down in the dungeon, but from the look of her food, it looked like she had slept through her first night as a prisoner. It was morning, she supposed, which meant that soon her job as a servant would begin officially.

The plate of fried eggs and a gruel-like substance held her over while she waited; this cooking was significantly better than her rations the day before. She wondered if she could keep her freedom if she continued to down the king's prison food like some animal starved for a week. It certainly didn't _feel_ like she was remaining the faithful rebel she had been at the rally. But what did that matter? According to the king, her name was Diana, as Clover to him was fit for a male, and she was to become an entirely new person while she was here—not that Galbatorix planned on ever letting her go anytime soon.

"Let's go, girlie."

It was much easier to ignore Maddox when things were on her mind, Clover thought. Almost too easy, if you took care not to breathe in too deeply.

Wherever she looked, she seemed to feel the presence of someone, some being that caressed her skin with bludgeoning fear and made her spine tingle as she walked down the familiar dark dungeon path up to the next floor of the castle. The floors seemed to have been cleaned since her last visit over them, but instead of despair hanging over them as they stood at the end of the throne room, there seemed to be a more lighthearted mood instilled. Perhaps Galbatorix had cast spells around this room to put her at ease—no. He wouldn't use magic to help her—definitely not. It only felt different because she was less disoriented and more alert, and because now she knew her purpose to the king. Or, at least, she _thought_ she did.

The king's eyes were as black as ever, and as he stared at her from the raven's perch he called a throne, she stiffened under her cuffs. Galbatorix smiled, showing two rows of vibrant white teeth, too perfect to be real.

"Diana, there you are." He looked up and cocked his brow pointedly at the guard. "Maddox, you may leave. And unbind her while you're here—she'll be fine on her own."

She didn't dare inhale as Maddox reached over with his beefy hands and unlocked the cuffs, pulling her wrists out none too gently. He lumbered away without another word, the silver chain dragging on the floor behind him.

Clover didn't move. "Galbatorix," she said. The dragon still wasn't with his Rider—and a little part of her longed for the winged beast to break through the glass of the windows and glide across the floor, just so she could see it. But that was a silly thing to want at a time like this, or even at all. She was against all forms of the king, whether human or not, and the dragon should be the last thing on her list of things to see while she was here for however long it took to leave.

"I trust you had an excellent sleep?"

She only looked at him coldly.

"Durza should be along," he said, and as if on some sort of cue, a rancid chill ran through the room. A liquid despair as cold as the king's eyes made Clover shiver where she stood. A flurry of shadows spawned from seemingly nowhere near the king's throne, by the white door on the other side of the room, and they swept around in a twister, deep holes in the atmosphere. They suddenly burst into nothingness, and where the smoke had been was now the red figure of the Shade that she could recognize from the king's message before. His hair was even darker red than in the images…memories…whatever they were…and the markings on his forehead seemed to have changed. He wore different clothes but kept the crushed black velvet cloak fastened about his throat; this man was powerful, and the gleam in his crimson eyes was altogether malicious, even with a passive expression on his face. She swayed in place as his presence washed over her, and she had to catch herself before she stumbled to the ground. It was a lot to take in all at once, and that _aura!_—black and evil and coldhearted…the air of a killer. And he _had_ killed, had killed countless innocents, and many others had suffered at his hand. But Clover was not about to be the next to experience such pain.

"Durza, this is your new servant, Diana," said Galbatorix. "Diana—Durza."

Clover met the Shade's ferocious eyes and somehow nodded her head. She wondered how she looked right then, with her hair a little more than tangled and her face tired from not sleeping well—altogether not very well suited for work. Something about the Shade silenced her, quelled the desire to lash out at the king. Through all of the magic surrounding him, permeating his body, she could still see that Durza was actually slightly handsome, in a devilish, cruel sort of way. She worked up the courage to stare into his eyes, meeting his gaze with an equally passive one, though hers was bitter.

"She will see to anything you need while you are here."

Durza inclined his head sharply. "Come," he said, and he turned on his heel and started for the white door a few paces away from the king's throne.

She stood there immobile for a moment, looking to the king for some sort of indication of what she should do. He frowned harshly at her, and she quickly darted across the beautiful throne room to the white door. She followed the Shade into a great hallway that she had never seen before, with polished tiles the color of sand and banisters of the finest wood in Alagaesia. It was difficult to keep up with him, but a moment later she took her eyes off of the pristine elf-made sconces and mysterious watercolor paintings on the walls; instead she focused on trotting along behind the Shade, close enough that strand of his red hair were getting caught in her mouth.

"His Majesty tells me that you are his prisoner," the Shade said over his shoulder. "Is this true?"

His almost bored tone, though not explicitly vindictive or cruel, held some sort of unspoken power over her—or rather, the entire hallway. Clover wondered whether there was a spell he had cast to strike fear into the hearts of those he dealt with, for she certainly felt her reserved demeanor slipping away into a rather submissive need to please at any cost. Still, Galbatorix hadn't seemed fearful of him…so why should she? But there was something about the way Durza was asking her that made her hesitate—a tingling drop of ice rippling the waves of her heart.

She quickly piped up, "Yes." They turned down a series of corners until a great glass door cut the hall off and let in a great expanse of the scenery outside; the sunshine warmed her skin as they came outside, where grassy hills as soft as velvet led the way to a round, one story building made of cement and brick. She didn't have much time to look around before they were inside the circular building, where grayish clay shelves were stocked with tiny jars of powders in every color and vials of liquid bubbled. There was a cauldron in the center of the building, which was just a single room that stretched wide in every angle, with clear water inside and a pile of firewood beside it. The air was a smoky musk, and she supposed that the Shade hadn't used this room in quite some time. Before Clover could shut the door, he was busy sliding open the dirty shutters on the windows; he swept a feather brush across the empty shelves as the light streamed in. Already the room was looking better: less like a prisoner's tomb and more like a sort of homey workshop.

Durza chuckled to himself. "It's a strange thing that he's done, keeping you here as a servant…or whatever it is you are. What is it that you did? How long have you been here?"

"I don't know, sir," said Clover. She slunk against the clay walls of the building and tried to blend in. Perhaps she would be much harder to kill if she couldn't be seen. "It was a Tuesday evening that I was rallying at a pub, where they caught me. I'm a rebel supporter, you see, and I was trying to get others to do the same. I wanted them to come with me and take action. And then—"

"The soldiers came, yes. I'm familiar with stories like these."

"I tried to run…and I got as far as the forest, but then they caught me." That was all she dared to say, for she didn't want him to know anything about where she came from or her village. "You wouldn't happen to know what day of the week it is, would you?"

"Sunday. Now hand me that mason jar." The Shade had already removed his cape and spat into the cauldron, tipping a flask and mixing the contents with a twirl of his finger. Clover was on her feet and passing her hands between several liquids in their respective tins and cans before settling on the amber liquid inside a clear jar. She bit her lip as she passed it to him without a word.

Durza paused and turned to face her, his lips spreading into a nasty grin. "You're scared of me, aren't you?"

Clover nodded ever so slowly. "Yes, Master Durza, sir."

"Interesting," he said, accepting the jar and pouring some of the amber goo into the cauldron, which was now bubbling a deep velvet color. "Because the way I see it, you're some kind of high-horse rebel who doesn't take no for an answer. You lead crowds of people to revolt against you king, and what—you're terrified of a little magic? Pathetic. I thought there was more to you than that. But I suppose you're really just some sniveling, submissive woman who will do anything to please her master, whom, might I add, was appointed to her by the very man she so despises?"

The room grew very dark, and a chill nibbled her skin until it turned to gooseflesh. The aura of smoky gloom around the Shade seemed to intensify so much that Clover felt it reach out and tousle her hair and stroke the side of her face with its malevolent fingers. Color rose to her cheeks, and she frowned, still lost in his frosty words. He was right—where _was_ her defiant spirit that wouldn't take any of this without a fight? The old her wouldn't have been so frightened of being killed by this Shade, she would have crossed him and struck him and yelled and cried for freedom; she would have escaped and gone in search of information to bring back to her village with her, and would have run back home to her sisters. _That_ was who she was: Clover Sharro, the young woman who could do the impossible for the love of her family and the people in her village.

All she could see was the evil thrill in his eyes from telling her off.

"I'm not submissive, sir," she said, a tiny fire lighting in her throat. She could feel anger boiling up inside of her chest, and it was begging to escape, roaring as loud as it could.

"Don't call me 'sir', then. Do you know what this is?"

Clover forced herself to look away from the head of long scarlet hair and blood eyes to match, frowning as she failed to place the goblet of fiery orange juice in the Shade's marked hands. She shook her head, noting its sour, wine-like smell. This couldn't have been what he was making in the cauldron a moment ago, this...

"The king's favorite mead," he explained. "He doesn't like anyone else to brew it but a select few...I happen to be one of those few. Something about those with a magical touch prepare it far better, he says, or perhaps it's simply because he prefers not to wait for his liquor. Try it."

He held it out to her, but her hand rushed up to stop it before her. She raised a brow, pursing her lips. "I don't think so," she said. "Maybe you should have some, first."

And without a single fear in her mind, she seized the goblet from his hand and threw the contents at his leather bound chest, orange liquid splashing everywhere. The Shade blinked, not seeming the least bit surprised that his new servant had done this to him. His face betrayed nothing as he quickly passed a hand over his clothes and whispered something inaudible, drying the mess as if nothing had happened. Clover waited with a defiant look on her face, her mouth in a firm line while her hazel eyes dared to look into the blood red ones with all the bravery in the world. A moment passed between them, when there was only silence and the sound of the brew in the cauldron sloshing against the sides of its stone home. The sunlight filtered through the window at the end of the circular abode, giving Durza's already bone white skin an eerie white glow and bathing everything in a warmth that could only come from nature itself. Birds sang to each other in the trees outside, and the grass swayed. Clover could feel it all as easily as her own heart beating in her chest, as easy as the breath that swelled from her lungs.

"You can feel magic, can't you, Diana?" asked Durza, turning to refill the goblet and taking a swig of the pumpkin colored juice. It was more of a statement than a question. Clover watched him as he drank, then took the glass from him as he lowered it. She mirrored what he had done, much to his apparent surprise—she considered the sudden inclining of his brow to be some form of surprise—and found that it _was_ mead, and particularly _good_ mead, too. Sweet and bitter all at once, with an edge like melted maple syrup and honey and a spark like diamonds.

"Yes, I can. Did Galbatorix tell you that?"

She drank a little more and handed the near-empty goblet back to him, pulling up an old wooden chair that had been hiding in the corner before sitting with a calm, bemused stare.

The Shade put down the goblet and slid into another empty chair across the room from her. "No," he said, twisting something on his finger. "I figured it out for myself. You wouldn't mind letting me into your head, now would you?"

Clover leapt to her feet defensively. Durza smiled for a moment, rolling his eyes as he gestured to the wooden chair behind her.

"Oh, sit down, sit _down_, child. I was only asking."

She resumed her reserved stare, but clenched the arm of the chair with white knuckles. The Shade hadn't scolded her for her presumptuous actions yet, but she still didn't trust him at all. There was something to be said for what he was doing, seeing as he hadn't tried to hurt or kill her, yet. She supposed that it would be too easy, like snuffing out the flame at the end of a candle—he would want to have his fun before he put it to an end. Killing her upon sight wouldn't be as enjoyable as getting inside her head and figuring how she ticked, to play with her like a cat pawing its submissive, trembling little mouse before it triumphantly bit its head off. The aura surrounding him still sent shivers down her spine, and she wondered how one was to grow used to such an unpleasant feeling, or how Galbatorix tolerated being around it all the time. She was determined not to let the black surrounding him get to her—she would sit there and take what he was dishing out. She was strong. She could do this. She was Clover Sharro, daughter of a blacksmith and his beautiful, loving wife. This was easy.

Just a straight shot around the gardens to the front of the castle, or out the back window in the main hall, and she would be past the guards and on her way to freedom. A revolution.

She could deal with the mind games of a Shade.

Durza shifted. "When was the first time you were exposed to magic, Diana?"

_That isn't my name,_ she thought, but she said nothing of Galbatorix's new title for her. She thought back to her younger years, when her parents were still alive and she wasn't acting as surrogate mother, and remembered being introduced to the wonderfully dangerous element in a storyteller's tent.

"I was six," she said. "I saw a storyteller named Brom light a fire when he thought nobody was looking. He caught me outside and tried to teach me how to focus in his tent everyday for a few weeks. I used to be able to pull the leaves off branches by asking them to, but I haven't practiced since Brom had to leave for Carvahall."

"And your parents…are they…magicians, gypsies?"

"My parents are dead," she said. She could see flashes of their faces through the hardness of her eyes, and for a moment she felt a disturbance in her head, like something touching her. She shook her head, dismissing it. "Killed by Galbatorix's soldiers many years ago—I don't like to talk about them. And they didn't do magic, no. Why do you ask?"

"Hmm," he mused. "Not everyone can sense magic, Diana."

Another scratch in her head. Clover shivered and flinched as something felt along her, something she recognized much too late.

She was six years old again, with her bare feet padding along in the damp grass as she sprinted towards the gypsy camps, where canvas could be seen pitched in tents, stripped into signs, and stitched together to make bags. The marketplace had just closed down with the setting of the sun, and the murmur of voices dispersed as the villagers left for home. Clover waved to a few of the gypsies behind their wooden counters and flashed a smile to a gypsy child she knew; her heart was pounding but her feet didn't stop until she stood outside the flap of a tan canvas tent, out of breath with a huge smile on her face. She could see the light shadow of the person inside as they moved about, muttering to themselves and thumping something shut.

Her smile grew wider as Brom opened the flap of the tent, his white beard clipped short and his hair still gray. The wrinkles on the old man's face softened as he returned her smile and beckoned her in. He opened his mouth to speak as she sat beside a small pot of leaves and branches and peered into the flames lapping them to ashes.

"I see you still like my fire tricks—"

_Get out,_ thought Clover. _This is not for you. _Whatever control she had left of her memories pushed forward, trying to find the invader and cut him off. He couldn't know her name, not her real one, anyhow. The Shade had no business knowing about her family, so she reached out for him inside of her head, doing the best she could to block out the words the vision of Brom was saying. She wasn't very successful—she could feel Durza's pleasure in making her try to fight him, and it made her weak. Brom's words faded in and out like an old radio, and she hoped that it was enough to throw him off.

"—over, you would think you come over just to see them!"

The six year old Clover giggled. "I want to learn how to make fire, Brom."

"You and the rest of your fam…" said Brom, reaching into a leather satchel and handing the girl three oval stones. "…should bring your sis…I'm sure she'd love…if you would _focus_, maybe you _could_ learn…"

_This isn't for _you! Clover tried again, feeling around her mind for another sign of the Shade. It was like pushing the fingers of a giant off of a tiny bug it was crushing in its fist, and the amount of pressure she felt was enough to bring her to her knees. She could see the Shade standing over her, his hand reached out to her as if he were helping her up. A strange grey matter flowed from his fingers to her body, and a silvery stream returned to him; his face was indifferent, and for a moment she stemmed the flow of memory to him, smashing against whatever wall it was she had found. The pressure lingered still, lighter for the briefest of moments and then as heavy as a ton of iron encasing her where she was.

Her eyes met his, and she could see her six year old self running out of the tent ahead of Brom, who was telling her something as she danced around the grass. A break in the connection, and suddenly young Clover was standing beneath a tree with her fists clenched at her sides, repeating two words over and over. She only had eyes for a skinny gray branch with a few dead leaves remaining, swaying back and forth as the spell progressed and faltered.

Back to Durza. The fingers of the giant encased her again and squeezed her like an oversized python. The fingers of the child, the leaves on the branch, the cold blood in the Shade's eyes. The markings on his forehead, the patience in Brom's steady hands.

She fought again. _Durza,_ she said to him, first in her mind and then out loud.

"Durza."

The pressure suddenly stopped, and for a moment she could stand and catch her breath, which she didn't remember losing in the first place. She looked into the Shade's eyes again, this time raising her brow in gratitude; before she could say another word, a flurry of different memories threw her backwards again, the giant's fingers seizing her with all the force of their first attack.

She was watching Brom pack up his tent and leave for Carvahall; she was taking her first sip of liquor in a pub at sixteen; the thrill of being on her own as she ran through the grassy fields in the fading sunlight; her first real fight at fifteen, with a boy who had stolen something from her father's shop; nursing a bruise on her arm and a bloodied lip and eye after being abused by a boy who had helped her after her parents' death; screaming at the top of her lungs in her father's shop and sleeping in the pile of hay for three days. Her rallies in the pubs, the joy of making a difference; the anger at Galbatorix for hurting her so close to home; the rage that fueled her mission for revolt; the crying faces of those who had come to the burial of her parents; the face of her youngest sister, with large brown eyes looking up at her—

_No!_ Before the Shade could go any further, before he could recognize either of her sisters or where she lived, she kicked and thrashed. In and out, back and forth: the glimmer of a stream in the sun, the Shade's outstretched hand, the fist of a young boy swinging toward her nose followed by a sea of blood, the blood that seemed to boil inside of Durza's eyes, the smell of hay and the perfume of her second sister—

And then Clover was on her feet, running toward the Shade with her teeth clenched, throwing herself at him with all the power she could muster. Her fists balled and swung, hammering blows to his chest and arms while her head spun. Surprised, the Shade staggered back, his eyes wide as the servant continued to bear down on him; running away in the forest, the dispersing crowd as the soldiers entered the pub, the dank smell of the dungeon and Maddox as he yanked against the cuffs holding her to the chains. She lunged for another shot, but before she could make further contact, Durza shoved her back, leaving her memories swirling back into her head.

Clover collided with her chair and fell to the ground, broken pieces of wood following her. She was panting, and her shoulders were racking with a sob that threatened to administer against her wishes. Her head throbbed like nothing she had ever felt before; she closed her eyes and felt the hot tears begin to form. Slowly, she stood up, brushing the dust off her clothes as she bit her tongue and stared into the eyes of the Shade.

Forced. No permission. He had seen things that she hadn't wanted him to see, felt emotions that she herself had felt, had ever seen glimpses of her home and family.

She felt so exposed, so vulnerable, so _barren._ There was nothing left to take from her.

She cleared her throat. "What will you have me do now, Shade?"

"That will be all for now. You may go back into the castle—I'm sure nobody will object to you retiring in your dungeon?"

She inclined her head and left the circular brick place, tears brimming and finally falling as she trudged through the dewy grass and felt the sun warm her hair. She was almost to the doors of the hall when she saw a hint of silky blue past a hill; her feet somehow carried her to the water's edge before she fell to her knees and cried, arms wrapped tightly around her middle.


	3. Chapter 3

It seemed that Galbatorix was never actually present in his castle.

Clover had searched the halls and poked her head through doorways, but caught no sight of the mighty king, or his dragon. She became accustomed to the rhythmic marching of soldiers leaving the courtyard in the morning, to the swishing of sheets and peals of laughter as the rambunctious maids made the beds before breakfast. Unless she was asked to attend to something past it, she wasn't usually allowed to leave her cell. Her curfew on those rare occasions was an hour after the sun went down; upon the striking of the hour, she was whisked away to her tiny quarters where the door was bolted shut several times.

The work she was doing was not particularly arduous—Durza often left her to dust the shelves in his stockroom or to go off in the field to search for some made up dandelion that he wanted her to find. The Shade was around as often as the king, and soon Clover found herself wondering when he would return, or when she would see him again.

This wasn't like how she thought it would be at all.

The days began to blend into one continuous cycle, and soon the aching in her heart that was her constant companion began to drift off, as if slumbering for winter. One morning as she took a sip of water and chewed on a piece of dry venison, an ethereal feeling overcame her, and she laid on her back with her eyes closed. She felt as if she were suspended in the universe by a pure light glowing inside of her chest, using its energy to pull a thick mask of fatigue over her body as she floated off…It was a strange thing to have not a care in the world, she thought—to only worry about if she was going to have to socialize with the rest of the servants. _Some_ of them didn't know when to keep their mouth shut…

There was a _shink!_ as the locks were all slid open at once.

It didn't sound like Marcus—he usually knocked on the wall before coming in…

She didn't have to open her eyes to feel the cool presence of the Shade bursting into her tranquil universe; the door shut promptly behind him, and Clover wondered faintly what he wanted. It was simple to push him back out and be filled again by that light, by that sheer joy permeating every limb in her body. She could hear him shifting next to her, but could think of no reason to leave…the longing in her heart had faded into a blissful trance that was carrying her out to sea…far away from villages and family and kings and rebellions…

"I want to talk to you, Diana," he said. It was peculiar how she found that she had missed that voice, that sneering growl that dripped with poison and always brought bad news…

She smiled and pulled herself into an upright position, her eyes still moving behind her lids. When had this feeling started? She had _always_ been in the castle, _always_ worked here as a servant…and always eaten the food.

_The food!_

She opened her eyes and was welcomed by a pair of piercing scarlet ones. "What did you do to me, Shade?" she said, her voice dropping an octave.

"I don't know what you mean."

But he did. He left a few minutes later with fresh thoughts in his head of faces that he had never seen before, buildings that he had never walked in. Slivers of her life were shown to him like a scene from a cinema. She held her throbbing head and tried to sleep.

Memory searching became a regular habit of the Shade; nearly every day Clover awoke from her dungeon and met him wherever she was instructed to go, whether a washroom or an empty hallway. He would have her do a simple task that he couldn't possibly be incapable of performing himself, and randomly would enter her mind and probe his fingers around her old life, grinning as she crumpled to the ground and writhed like a dying animal while she desperately fought as hard as she could to protect herself and her family.

The frequent invasions were enough to make Clover almost too weak to get up in the morning, and soon enough, she was eating very little of what was on the trays pushed into her cell and vomiting almost all of it back up. She almost always had some sort of headache, was out of breath, or was much too exhausted to speak. After two weeks of routine jobs and restless torture, the days began to blend into one continuous cycle. She could only tell it was a new day from the difference in the food she was served, and occasionally when she bothered to look out the window.

One afternoon she was sorting books in the circular building, skimming over the titles and trying her best to keep them in alphabetical order. Durza was outside somewhere, doing whatever it was helped him with his magic. She was bracing herself for when he returned; he would attack her mind then. It seemed now that it was less of her memories he was combing through, but more of an actual attack. Now it seemed he would enter her mind to hold her motionless while he inflicted the real damage on the surface: she had already acquired quite a collection of scrapes and bruises, with patches of purple mottling her diaphragm and belly and deep crusted scabs on her legs. She was accustomed now to being thrown at walls by the Shade, to being smacked in the face and raked with sharp fingernails whenever she was doing something wrong.

Or even when she was doing something _right._

A heavy volume fell from the top shelf just as she finished. _Gramarye_, the first word said. The rest she couldn't make out. She flipped through the pages, waiting for anything interest to appear—and after a moment, it did. There on the page was something written in the Ancient language, and the translation below read "Sleeping Draught".

And there were the instructions to make it.

From what she could understand, the draught rendered the victim completely unconscious for seven minutes, thereby eliminating any protective spells erected around them. The rest was written mostly in the Ancient language, so she quickly ripped the page from the book and stuffed it into her pocket, slamming it closed and replacing it just as the door swung open and Durza walked in.

"Are you finished, Diana?" he asked, approaching her. She nodded and held her arms out to him, her palms hanging limply toward the ground. She only opened her scrunched up eyes when she noticed the absence of pain on her arms or anywhere else on her body—there was only Durza's questioning face and the pink scars marking her hands.

Clover lowered her arms. "You're…_not_ going to hit me?"

"You seemed to have completed your task correctly—and nothing has been touched, I presume?"

She nodded, not knowing what else to do.

"Then follow me."

Outside, the trees still swayed their feathery leaves low enough that they tickled Clover's nose as she passed through them; the grass was as velvety green as ever, and the birds continued to sing. Butterflies flitted around the sparse white flowers and sailed through branches; squirrels hopped through the leaves of trees and skittered down the trunks to the dirt. Durza led her down to the glassy pond she had found on her first day with him, where water striders skimmed along the surface near them.

"Hold still," he instructed, and took Clover's arm. He whispered something she didn't understand, and the scars on her hands faded back into her skin. He gripped her shoulders and did the same, and then knelt to heal the bruises on her legs. A minute later, every wound and cut was healed—even the gash across her navel from when he had struck her with a blade one morning.

She tentatively peered at her reflection at the water's edge, and was astounded to find that the girl looking back at her was the same girl that had roused a crowd of rebels all those weeks ago. She was a little paler, and her eyes were still tired looking from her irregular sleep schedule, but she was still the same.

She looked to Durza, who had assumed his usual mask of indifference. As much as she didn't wish to feel so, a tiny splurge of gratitude moved her to clear her throat and carefully touch the Shade's shoulder.

"Thank…ah, thank you, Durza," she said, and sat on a pile of logs. He lowered himself to the ground and folded his hands in his lap, looking to her with…an almost _interest._

"That boy who hurt you," he said. "Who was he?"

Her eyes darted to the ground. She had never spoken of what had happened between her and Henry, the person she had counted on in the early months to help take care of her sisters. A lump formed in her throat. "He…his name was Henry," she said.

"And he abused you?"

_You would know all about abusing someone, wouldn't you?_ "I…he didn't mean to do it, he only got frustrated sometimes. It was my fault for putting so much on him at once."

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"I needed some help," she started. "After Galbatorix killed my parents, I was looking out for more than just myself. I met him when I was drinking one night, and we became friends. We were together for a month before he started hitting me. He knew a little magic, and sometimes he tried to burn me. I didn't know how to get out of it, and it was just me he was hurting, so I let it go on. He left three months later, and I was on my own again."

She looked back at Durza, who seemed to be genuinely in tune with what she was saying. She realized with a start that the usual black aura around him had dimmed into a low gray, barely detectable, and his eyes were much less red than she remembered. What was going on? Was he going to strike her again after he had healed her and listened to one of her life stories? If his mask of indifference was unreadable before, the understanding and passion in his eyes was even more so. She didn't know what to say or think.

"I'm…sorry, Diana," he said, struggling to get the words out. "I'm sorry that you had to experience such a terrible time with Henry and that…I apologize also for…my actions. You didn't deserve any of what I did to you…and I am sorry for that."

Clover blinked slowly. If he thought that she could just forgive him like that after weeks of torture, then he was absolutely wrong. Healing the physical wounds did nothing to the emotional damage he had inflicted on her—the recurring fear, lack of sleep, inability to keep down her food…her initial attempt at securing her freedom, at trying to take back her fearless self, had sailed off on the first day with the Shade. All hopes at becoming the person she had been, the Galbatorix-hating, vengeance-seeking young woman who wanted nothing more than to escape and get back to her rebellion…they were gone. And if the Shade expected her to return to herself simply by being apologized to…well, she couldn't. It wasn't that easy.

"I can't accept your apology, Shade," she said. "Not yet."

Clover stood, regarded the Shade for a moment, and walked back toward the castle.

Marcus creaked open the cell door as quietly as he could. He held out his hand and guided the prisoner out into the hallway sans chains, boots splashing in the puddles of water on the floor.

"I shouldn't have to tell you this," he whispered, "but be careful. I won't be able to cover for you if you are caught. Try and be back in ten minutes."

Clover found that it was almost thrilling to dart down the hallway, listening intently for the sound of guards patrolling or of Galbatorix himself speaking to a servant. It was much more dangerous running outside at such a late hour, when the sky was a pitch black and the only company she had were the magic torches casting her shadow yards behind her. After three minutes of rushing around corners and tripping down corridors, she was finally standing before the circular building where the Shade liked to work.

Amazingly, the door was unlocked—anyone who could possibly want to go inside would have to get inside the castle first, and that meant facing countless guards, and she was already past them all.

She lit a few candles and a torch on the wall before setting off to work.

The water she had drawn for tea was boiling; she cried out sharply as her hand was scalded. She knew he was raising his brow at her, his face smug, but she refused to acknowledge him. Her eyes flicked upon the brazen jewel pendant around his neck.

"What's that?" she asked, separating leaves to ignore her throbbing flesh.

The Shade fingered the pendant, the polished ruby casting a ruddy glow on his white skin.

"A gift," he said airily.

She snorted. "More likely stolen."

"You don't believe that I could have come by something honestly?"

"I don't believe you have the _time_ for honesty, Shade." She still spat out the word like a curse.

"Hm."

Durza inspected his boot while Clover filled a pair of silver teacups. She handed him his tea and sat opposite him, stirring her own. A flurry of steam blocked his magical presence from view for a short moment, and if she closed her eyes, it was almost like a bad dream she could escape from.

"I take it from last night's efforts, you wish to learn magic," he said. Clover nearly choked on her tea.

But she had left no trace! All the books had been replaced, the floor swept for good measure…she had even scrubbed the cauldron and refilled the salt from the jar beneath the table…

"How did—"

His smirk said it all.

Of course. Of _course_ he had some detection enchantment around the storehouse. It was ridiculous for her _not_ to expect such a thing from…ugh, how she _hated_ herself for this!

She paused. "I admit to being a little curious," she said. "But you didn't…you didn't stop me. You weren't there, were you? Why didn't you stop me? Why? Tell me, Shade!"

"There is much you do not know about me, Diana. Perhaps you should think about the consequences before you do something…reckless?"

_That's not my name,_ she almost spat. _And I know _plenty_ about your kind._

But she didn't say any of that. Instead she quickly closed her eyes and clamped her teeth shut, body frozen, waiting for the slithering sting of pain that was sure to come. She sat like this for a moment before tentatively opening her eyes. There was no pain besides her burned hand, which definitely needed to be treated soon. No rattling of bones, no prodding inside of her head.

There was only Durza sitting across from her, taking a sip of his tea before he placed it on the table. And somehow her hand ended up in his, bone white fingers grazing her burn. There was a gentle pull of something far less than pain—a sudden, acute awareness. Her hand itched, and beneath the burn, new skin cells began to flood and suffocate the old. She watched soundlessly as her skin repaired itself before her very eyes. It felt natural and easy. Too easy. She snatched her hand back, eyeing him warily.

"What did you do?"

"Are you still only mildly curious about magic?" he asked, his words like acid. He suddenly rose to his feet and paced the room. Every step seemed to keep time with the beating of Clover's heart—the Shade's voice had become dangerous, and as much as she thought she had him figured out, she really had no idea when he was going to punish or strike her.

And there was plenty to punish for.

She had broken into his storehouse. She had tried to play with spells like a reckless child. She had invaded his magical library. She constantly barked back orders like some mocking wild dog…she challenged his authority on a regular basis, pushing her limits just as she was now! Where was the mind probing, the slap across the face? Where was the consequence?

What exactly had she gotten herself _into?_

He passed her a volume as thick as his index finger emblazoned with an etching of a feather. "I can teach you simple words in nature: tree, branch, water. I can teach you to control the thing by knowing its name. Names are crucial things…" He watched her through a sheet of crimson hair as she flipped to a page at random. "Silver. Excellent. You will begin by memorizing the name. 'Arget'. Say it."

"Arget."

He passed a silver coin into her palm. "I want you to lift it. You will say 'arget risa."

This was a test, she knew it. It was the correct answer that she did not know, and playing along seemed less of a risk than to ignore his spur of the moment lesson.

"Arget…arget risa."

The words tasted odd when she said them. The coin did nothing but rest in her hand, still hot from when Durza had touched it. She looked to the Shade blankly.

"I don't think it works the same for me as it does for you," she said.

Durza sighed. "I know you know of the Ancient Language," he said. It was a statement, not a question. "You know it takes time to learn the words, and be able to speak them. You know one cannot simply speak the language without any practice and achieve their goal. There is a section dedicated to the history of the Ancient Language at the beginning of that book. Read it, if you wish to understand even a part of what magic truly is."

Clover stared at the silver coin in her palm and bit her lip. "Arget risa."

Nothing happened.

"Arget risa," she repeated. "Arget risa!"

But the silver coin refused to obey her.

She stood and pressed the source of her frustration into the Shade's palm and took a deep breath. "I want to see _you_ do it, Shade."

Without a moment's hesitation, the piece of silver jumped as high as Clover's head and danced around her nose.

"No. Use the same words as I did." He was taunting her, she knew he was. She plucked the piece from the air and pressed it back into his hand.

"Arget risa."

The piece of silver left his palm and hung suspended a few feet above them.

The dark aura that resided around the Shade's figure seemed to wax strong for a moment, laughing at her. She was weak. She was incompetent. She wanted to do everything, but could accomplish nothing. He body slumped into a cold defeat, her eyes threatening to give way to tears. She wanted to go back to her cell and curl up and…

"Stop it!" she cried, backing into a chair. "Whatever it is you're doing, stop it right now!"

And it did. The chill left her, and she met Durza's eyes with a horrified look, as much as she tried to collect herself. He tossed the silver piece at her and turned to leave.

"Read the book and practice," were his last words, and Clover was left with the silver coin burning hot in her palm. She looked down at the healed skin of her burn and made a fist. The first blow was strangely satisfying, the second infinitely more so. Shards of glass skittered around her feet, fine powders were blown out of their jars in miniature explosions; bubbling liquids in every hue rained down on the floor as she smashed countless mason jars and bottles on the shelf. With each new thing she crushed, relief warmed her body. Everything that had ever been done to her while she was here in Uru'baen…every memory that the Shade had seen…She wanted to see him try and do magic now without his precious ingredients, without his eye of newt and blood of a serpent.

She left the storeroom with bloody knuckles and cut up fists, a smear of something purple across her lips. A fragment of glass was splintered in her thumb. She tracked grainy black dust into the castle; she didn't care if anyone threw a fit over it, she viewed it like a symbol of who she was. She was Clover Sharro—and she was going to get back home, one way or another.


	4. Chapter 4

Marcus had become something of a friend to Clover as the weeks passed. When he was allowed time off every other afternoon, he would take her down to the kitchens and have one of the cooks give her the first slice of freshly baked fig bread or a taste of fruit pudding. Then they would often go down by the pond and tell each other riddles, and then dip their feet in the water. She had a surprising amount of freedom these days for still being a prisoner, and her suspicions were confirmed as Marcus opened his cell door one night.

"His Majesty would like to see you in the dining hall," he said. "I'm to escort you."

The king had already finished eaten when she got there, but half-finished dishes and plates that had yet to be taken up littered the rectangular table. He greeted her by inclining his head. "Diana."

Marcus had already left the room, so he wasn't there to soften her clenched fists or keep her from staring with all the venom of an adder at the king.

"Sit."

Her body was a magnet attracted to the opposite pole of the chair at the head of the table. She didn't dare try to scramble to her feet, though she tried in vain to wiggle her toes on the floor. Unlike with Durza, she was far less eager to push the boundaries here.

"I have decided to release you from the dungeons," he began. "You will stay in the one of the empty maid's rooms on the third floor. Do not think that this releases you from being a prisoner here."

Clover couldn't help but offer a sardonic smile. "Why are you doing this? You're not going to kill me, yet?"

The king's face was unchanged. "I have yet to decide what I am going to do with you. Until then, you are going to work as a servant to everyone else in the castle, including myself. You will learn from the other maids and servants what to do."

"And what of the Shade?"

"Durza will still be your primary master," said the king. He rolled the last bit of wine in his glass around before finishing it. "But you will now see to the guards of the castle…and as I already said, myself. You begin tomorrow afternoon. You are dismissed, Diana."

Clover didn't bother to curtsy or bow to the king before she fled from the dining hall.

That night she dreamed of Durza. Wrapped in the white sheets on the cot against the wall of her new room, she tossed and turned.

His hair was as long and red as ever, draped like a curtain down his back. His eyes glittered like poisonous rubies as he looked at her and then turned away. He was on the shore of the lake near the storehouse, his leather boots buried in mounds of sand. She didn't see herself in the dream, but she knew that she was present. The Shade touched the pendant around his neck and whispered words she did not recognize. Gray spirits washed into the air from the center of the pendant, forming into figures on the sand. Ghosts of the countless people the Shade had slain walked on the shore, some dipping their toes into the water, all with crestfallen faces and limp arms. None of them seemed to want to be there.

Dozens of ghostly bodies formed on the base of the lake, until the Shade could no longer be seen except for the dark aura around his devilish body. Among the dead spirits were two girls, one just growing into a young woman, and a much smaller one with wavy hair down to her elbows. Clover gaped at the faces of her sisters and reached out to touch them. The older on shook her head, her braids swaying loosely in the wind. Her eyes were sad and lonely, and they reflected the distant moonlight in the sky. The young one heaved a sigh and ran out to the water, letting the waves wash over her calves and dampen her tunic.

Clover woke with a gasp, and found that her eyes were filled with tears. Something burned in her pocket, and she removed the silver piece and tossed it into the air. "Arget risa."

Instead of falling back into her hand, it stayed in place inches above her palm. She untangled herself from the sheets and padded down the hallway, turning the piece over and over with her frozen fingers.

The lake was still that night, nearly white from the moon's glow. No waves stirred its surface, but the sand on the bank seemed to be softer than usual. She looked at the mass of pine trees on the far side of the water, turning the piece again.

"Arget risa."

The coin did as she asked.

Her heartbeat slowed from its erratic pace. There were no ghosts here. Her sisters were safe at home. It had only been a dream…hadn't it?

She didn't know how long she stood there with the midnight breeze sweeping her hair and casting tiny ripples on the water. The silver piece in her hand seemed to grow hotter over time, but she continued to raise it into the air until she began to grow weary.

"Arget risa…arget…" She let the piece drop back into the hand and returned it to her pocket. She was much too tired to keep the magic up, though it soothed her. She lumped to her knees in the sand, trying to think of something other than her sisters' grey faces spawning on the bank of the water.

"I see you got it to work," said a voice. "I thought you would."

The Shade stood beside her, close enough that she could smell the leather of his boots. "I want to learn more magic, Shade."

The moment she said it, she knew it was true. It had been a few weeks since he had first taught her what she could do now, and they hadn't spoken of magic since. In fact, Durza had been absent most of those two weeks, off doing she didn't know what. She hated herself for asking him about it now. She corrected immediately.

"Sorry, if you _wanted_ to teach me, I would like to learn more magic." She inched closer to the lake and removed her shoes. The water felt beautiful against her tired feet, and she closed her eyes and leaned back.

"I suppose if you had enough patience to listen, then yes, I could teach you more."

His answer came as a shock to her. She looked at him in the dim light of the moon, brow raised, and noticed that his usual aura was…nearly undetectable. Or was it even there, anymore?

He knelt down beside her. His eyes seemed far less menacing now. The breeze picked up and cast little waves cascading across the lake; water splashed against her feet. She felt the ends of his long red hair brush against her elbow.

"I know what it is you want," he said after a while. Clover shifted her body to face him, waiting. "I know what you wanted when you broke into the storehouse. You were looking to make a sleeping draught, something that certainly cannot be made by any novice magician.

"You were intending on somehow slipping it to King Galbatorix, subduing him long enough to kill him. You were then going to distract the security enough to escape undetected, and were going to make a run for home."

These weren't questions. He was right.

"You want to go back home. You will do anything it takes, though you have started to give up hope that you will make it." He paused, and the wind brushed his hair against her elbow again. She did not shy away. He continued. "You have always been interested in magic. It had always captivated you, and you have always wanted to learn its secrets. I can teach you these secrets, Diana, if you let me."

"Clover." Her voice was hoarse.

"What?"

She swallowed and tried again. "My name is Clover," she said. It was strange to have actually told him. She watched his eyes for a sign of anything…dark…of…_anything_, really. She only saw the glimpse of astonishment that quickly became a tiny smile, a light inside of his eyes.

"You never seemed like a Diana."

"Can you…help me become, ah…a magician? To be better at magic?" She took the hot silver piece and passed it between her hands. "I can…I can serve you more, I can…I'll make you breakfast early every morning, and I'll have the storeroom cleaned whenever you use it, and I'll gather ingredients or books or—"

He didn't put a hand on her knee, but it sure felt like he had. The flow of her words had been cut off abruptly—she suspected he must have whispered something to silence her. His eyes met hers and he said in a passive voice, "I will teach you."

She was still searching for the aura that always surrounded him, but could only see the sand and grass and trees behind him. She looked down, not willing to show him the smile that she was sure he could see anyway. "How…how was your…wherever you went?" She wasn't expecting him to answer.

But he did.

"I had some business to attend to near Surda," he said, shifting. "I'm sorry I didn't say anything beforehand. You had things to do here, yes?"

"I kept myself busy. Some of the guards are nice."

"I suppose they are."

There was a long moment of quiet between them, with nothing more than the swaying of the trees around the lake. "I've been moved out of the dungeons," she finally said. "Galbatorix wanted me out, I guess. I have my own room now and everything! Well, it comes with more work to do…I'm serving His Majesty himself now. And his soldiers, as well. I don't know what it was that made him release me. He says he doesn't know what he's going to do with me, yet."

"Mm. Perhaps he'll have you killed."

"Actually, I thought that if anyone would have me killed, it would be you, and you'd be the one to do it. Long before he would, anyway."

"Hm."

She wondered how late it was. She was still half expecting the silvery gray ghosts to erupt from the Shade's pendant, which…he wasn't wearing it tonight. She bit her lip.

"You seem different."

"Hm."

"'Hm' is not an answer, Shade," she said. She wrapped her arms around her knees. "Hang on. Why aren't you berating me for speaking to you like a friend? Where's the forced entry into my head?"

He was silent for a moment, staring at the soft white sand.

"Perhaps we could…be friends."

Her eyes widened, and she almost laughed. "What's wrong with you?"

"Clover…" His eyes were almost hazel now, and for a moment she wondered if she had only imagined that they were ever as red as blood. "I will show you how to make the sleeping draught potion…and teach you the words in the Ancient Language…but you must swear that you won't use magic to harm the king."

"Swear?"

"In the Ancient Language."

It was definitely unexpected, but she agreed. He told her the words to say, and though they still tasted like an overripe fruit on her tongue, she promised not to harm Galbatorix with the magic that the Shade taught her.

"I will call upon you in the next few days," he told her. He fished in his pocket for a second before coming up with something. He passed her a thin gold chain that sparkled in the moonlight. "This will ward off any nightmares and allow you to sleep better. Now enjoy your new room…and go back to sleep."

She couldn't help but think later that night, as she curled up on her cot with the gold chain around her neck, that the Shade had had something to do with her new living arrangements. She didn't entertain the thought for long.

True to what Durza had said, she did sleep much better that night. Instead of seeing the pained expressions on her younger sister's faces, she saw them laughing and playing and singing songs, just as they had months ago before their eldest sister had left them. Fresh tears covered her face the next morning, but they were happy, longing tears. She missed her sister terribly.

She wondered if the Shade had any charms for crying all the time.


	5. Chapter 5

There were five maids on the third floor of the castle, ranging in age from thirteen to seventy. One was too cross to bother with the newcomer, another had to rush a pile of fresh linens to His Majesty's chambers, and the eldest was far too busy to speak. Mira, a small girl with large green eyes and copper hair, was the one who volunteered to help Clover learn her tasks. She had been the only one who had actually smiled at her when she had come into the room. The second youngest of the maids, Mira had just celebrated her sixteenth birthday, and as the maid wiped a smudge of dirt from her cheek, Clover's heart sent a silent but painful call to home. By now, the first of her younger sisters would be sixteen; she wondered if Winter was doing all right…

"Sarah's already helping with kitchen duty," Mira began. "So you won't need to worry about that." There was a subtle lilt to her voice, different than that of what was commonly heard in Uru'baen. "We rotate chores, so today you'll be setting table with me in the dining hall. Then you'll be washing linens and helping with laundry. Tomorrow you'll have kitchens all day, and that's scrubbing dishes and the like as well as helping prepare food with the cooks. Think you can manage all that?"

Clover nodded, and followed the head of flat copper hair out of the maid's room and into the dining hall. Unlike her encounter with Galbatorix, a matter of weeks ago, the hall now bustled with a number of people clad in pressed white uniforms and aprons. Every face seemed to tell a story: some had wrinkles on their forehead, some were overtly feminine while others were bold and masculine; crow's feet sprouted from under more than a few eyes, noses stuck out at a point, lips were pouted…but they all carried the same monotonous expression of a worker who wished they were somewhere else.

"Grab that tablecloth there," Mira instructed, and she helped stretch the tentlike linen across one of the lengthy tables. They repeated the action with several other wine colored tablecloths, smoothing out creases, looking around to find the brass candelabra to place among the handful of fresh flowers Mira was arranging in the center. Perhaps it was the early morning hour—the sun had no intention of rising anytime soon—that made her weary, but after setting six tables with the maid and running between rooms to retrieve a misplaced silver goblet or crate of chicken's eggs, Clover was too tired to speak. It was arduous work, stacking earthenware bowls atop glass plates, pushing in chairs and sweeping enormous tiled floors, washing windows and scrambling around bodies to find the bouquet that needed to be placed just so. She didn't understand how Mira could be so passive about it, not complaining, not murmuring, just getting everything done as if it was her solemn duty.

"I don't get it." She said later that afternoon during lunch.

Mira looked up from her plate of berries. "Don't get what?"

"How can you do this day in and day out, taking orders and telling people where things go, trying to get everything perfect? How do you stand working so hard all the time?"

The young maid popped a purple berry into her mouth and smiled weakly. "It's what I'm here for. A lifetime of service…that's exactly what I'm going to provide."

"But don't you get tired? Don't you want to leave Uru'baen? Surely this can't be all there is for you—don't you have a home to return to?"

Mira shook her head. "I was born here. My mother came from Gil'ead, and she worked as a cook until her passing a few years ago, and she taught me the value of hard work…I don't remember the first time I picked up a rad and washed dishes, that's how young I was, but I've always done it."

"You aren't…" she paused and tried to imagine living in the same place as Galbatorix her entire life. She shuddered. "You don't mind being a servant to Galbatorix?"

"Not…not really, no. I haven't know any different, y'see…and I understand that he's done some terrible things, yes—"

"Terrible things? He's killed thousands of people, Mira!"

"Yes, but what choice do I really have? Do you think I'll ever really have a chance to leave here? Of course not. I have accepted that this is who I am. I'm really quite happy here."

She let the subject drop, and the two spent the rest of lunch in silence.

Clover loathed being a maid. It made her tired and unpleasant, she was required to rise much too early, and there was much too much to do and not enough time to do it in, and the king was expected to have breakfast early in his chambers, so all her efforts had been for naught…

She loathed it, but it certainly gave her something to occupy her time.

Laundry wasn't much better, though it was far less strenuous than setting a dining hall; she could stay in one place for a while, lathering soap onto clothes, hanging them out to dry, and then folding them mechanically once she had swapped places with Mira. It really wasn't so terrible except for the bickering between two of the maids—she couldn't escape from it. Gwen, a beautiful dark haired maid from downstairs, had come in to clean the windows when she had discovered that her prized hairpin was missing. She came into the laundry room red in the face, immediately accusing a portly older maid named Jin of stealing it.

"Oh, don't pay any attention to them," whispered Mira, rolling her eyes. "It's always something with those two…always at it. Last week, Jin was out of sorts being of Gwen's singing during breakfast. Ugh."

Clover scrubbed an oversized tunic and tried not to listen as Gwen protested that she needed the hairpin in order to look presentable for one of the guards who had requested she stay the night in his room. Jin told the dark haired maid that her behavior was sickening, and that just because you had a pretty face and a tiny waist that it was no excuse to go around handing yourself to any man who asked. And the guard probably wouldn't be paying any attention to her hairpin, anyway. Gwen told her to take her abnormally large rear and clear out of other people's business. More was said, and Gwen stormed out in an angry huff, hips swaying from side to side. Before long, Clover found herself missing the Shade, wanting to be out searching for some plant in the fields that definitely did not exist or knocking things over in the storeroom in some act of defiance. Her lips longed to taste new magic, and she mouthed the two words she already knew; it was hard not to actually say them, but she resisted. She was far too exhausted already, and she wasn't about to pass out because she tried to make a silver coin float in the washroom. If the Shade were here, he would probably say something about control. Hmph.

What did he know about control, anyway?

"Who's Winter and Sage?" she expected him to ask when she arrived. "Why do they need you so much, and how is it you still haven't asked anyone for help?" She felt like he knew everything that went on in her head since he gave her the gold chain, though she doubted it was doing anything than helping her sleep.

But Durza didn't ask any of that. In fact, he hardly asked her anything during their brewing session other than to pass him a measuring spoon or a package of some ingredient. After being called three days later, Clover spent her afternoon and most of the evening cutting and crushing a wiry plant stalk, boiling something that smelled like stale potatoes, and pursing her lips while poring over a recipe that was written half in English, partly in the Ancient Language, and partly in some other tongue she couldn't even begin to comprehend. The Shade was her translator when it came to this.

"Beetroot," he would mutter. "Second shelf on the left." "A pinch of salt." "Stir it slowly."

He still hadn't said anything about her destroying his stocks of ingredients, and somehow most of the jars, bottles, and occasional vial of funny smelling liquid had reappeared. She had completely forgotten about the incident until their brewing sessions had begun, and upon seeing the shelves restocked, her hand had leapt to the gold chain around her neck. Somehow she knew that she wasn't going to befall any trouble for what she had done; the sleeping charm reassured her of that. But someone was responsible for cleaning her mess…it couldn't have been Mira…?

The sleeping draught took eight days to prepare, and six more to ferment. By the third day of brewing, Clover was finished toying with things she didn't understand.

She wiped her forehead, leaving behind a smudge of ash. "I thought," she said through gritted teeth, "you were going to _help_ me, Shade."

His eyes were no longer the hazel from the night at the lake, and he flashed a heated look. "And I _will._"

The darkness was particularly clouded around him today, a deep violet that made his red eyes seem even redder, an enormous serpent coming from its cave. He rolled his eyes and flipped a page in his book before he suddenly paused and looked up, sniffing the air.

"Oh, damn it, did you burn it?"

He ran over to the cauldron where Clover had been standing with her hand on her hip and pushed her aside. He got to work immediately. It was almost like clockwork, how he muttered to himself and tipped the contents of vials into the brew, methodical and precise like a machine. He had done this before, and definitely knew what he was doing.

When he was finished, he whirled around to face her. "Damn it, girl, you nearly wasted my ingredients!"

Even when he was at his worst, the Shade had never kicked her before. His boot was a heavy, blunt force knocking the wind out of her, sweeping her feet out from beneath and leaving marks down her sides and legs. Her chin rushed to meet the floor, and she rolled over and spat out blood; she had bitten her tongue.

Clover had always known him to resort to magic first and physical violence second, if at all. He had only hit her a fair number of times, the number of magical incidents was significantly higher. The delivery altered the meaning to a degrading, terrible blow, not just a simple parlor trick gone wrong. She wanted to cry.

"Get up!" he ordered. She didn't have a moment to even try before she was put back on her feet. He struck her hard across the face, the pendant swinging around his neck. She whimpered, but did not cry out; she deserved this, all of it.

The gem in the pendant had grown brighter when the Shade's temper flared but now it dulled to its usual shining ruby face. His eyes had changed, too: a flicker of brown as he lowered his hand and stood back.

He spoke. "I—I…The potion is fine. We will continue tomorrow."

Mira nursed the swelling on Clover's cheek while Clover surveyed the rest of the damage. There was a deep, purple bruise on her calf that had spread to the relative size and shape of a maple leaf; she couldn't move her leg without something stinging. She was torn between hating the Shade and thanking him for finally giving her some form of punishment—the silence and lack of consequence he possessed these days was unbearable.

She cursed the Shade an infinite number of times under her breath as Mira applied ice to her cheek. The maid didn't ask about what had taken place, merely smiled sadly and continued to help.

"That…he really hurt me, Mira," she said. Her eyes were wet with tears, and a sob pushed for release. But she wouldn't let it—she had gone more than her fair share of crying lately. "I don't know what to do…I don't know what to think. I hate him. I really _hate _him."

But what she didn't say was how much she liked him. How much she really missed the Durza from the night at the lake, the one who listened to her and wanted to help. The one with the sparkling hazel eyes and the scarlet hair that brushed her arm…where had _that_ Durza run off to?

"I remember the first time I ever got beat," said Mira, sitting back on her heels. She closed her eyes and laughed, a strange half-hearted chuckle. "I was seven. I had broken a pair of brass candlesticks…I tripped over something and dropped them. One of the king's men saw…he was so angry with me. He hit me so hard, I thought that I might die that day. Well, back then I thought my life was ending if my hair wasn't braided perfectly or if didn't look presentable for the king…puh. I really was okay, though, and I soon got over it. I certainly learned to watch my step after that…hm. Seems like ages ago."

Clover wiped her nose on her sleeve. "That really happened to you? That's terrible!"

The young maid nodded and handed her a handkerchief. "My mother used to sing me a song whenever I was feeling down in times like these."

"Did she? How did it go?"

"Ah…something like…" Mira looked down at the floor, spinning the ribbon of her apron around her fingers, and sang in a high, faraway voice,

_You are so pretty  
'Tis a shame, 'tis a pity  
That you're sad_

_I think of you always  
Even on the bad days  
When you're sad_

_I love you forever  
Sing this song and you'll never  
Feel sad, sad, sad._

Clover smiled and put a hand on the maid's shoulder.

"That's beautiful, Mira. Thank you."


	6. Chapter 6

She would turn twenty-one in the spring, but Clover felt like a small child as she walked into the king's chamber. An asymmetrical ceramic vase glazed in topaz blue and swirled with gold greeted her outside the enormous doorway, marking the beginning of a plethora of gold accents. Inside the room, the lining of the crimson canopy over the four poster bed was a shimmery gold, as was the embroidered rug on the floor and the frame of the map on the far wall. Ornate sculptures no larger than Clover's forearm danced atop painted gold end tables that cropped up in every other corner. After a minute of standing in a blinding sunshine of gold, she never wanted to see the color again. The effect was almost sickening.

Nobody was in the room, so she called out, "You wanted me?"

"Diana, Diana, Diana," she heard him say. The nauseating voice grew louder each time he said his invented name for her, and she shuddered. A curtain at the far end of the room swung to the side (the curtain was a red velvet and thankfully not like the rest of the accents in the room), and Galbatorix strode out from what she soon found to be the entrance to an additional chamber. "Just the woman I wanted to see. To start you off, the bed needs turning…and refill the water pitcher, will you?"

"Is that all? That you called me for? Couldn't you have gotten one of the others to help you?"

"Actually, no. I have something else for you whenever you've finished."

She tended to the bed and went to fill the water pitcher. She considered dropping it on the way back, but he would only add it to the list of things for her to do. As she returned to the dripping gold chamber, she caught Galbatorix watching her. She had never noticed how his tan skin gleamed like a piece of freshly hammered piece of copper. She shook her head to rid the thought, and slammed the pitcher on the nightstand. He was still watching her carefully, his feet propped up on a chest of drawers; he sat in a luxurious high backed chair with beautiful carved armrests made of cherry wood.

"I got you your water. Now what do you want?"

"Oh, that's no way to speak to your king, Diana." His dark eyes negated to cease their mocking. "Or have you forgotten your place? Shut the door."

She shook her head, her hand on her hip. She leaned to one side. "No. I'm not shutting the door, and you deserve much worse than bad manners."

His skin was still delightfully brilliant, and his shoulder length hair was a silky coal black. Her fingers itched to run through it, wanted to stroke the sides of his face and the short mustache beneath his slender slope of a nose…

What was _wrong_ with her?

The door shut of its own accord, despite her wishes.

Galbatorix cocked an eyebrow. "Still playing that game, hm?" He chuckled. Clover struggled to keep her hand from reaching out. He was only just across the room, and it would be so easy to close that distance in a matter of seconds…

NO! This was Galbatorix, this was—

"I'll ask you again," she said. "What more do you want?"

"Nothing of importance. What does the rest of your evening look like?"

She rolled her eyes. "How should _I_ know? You've got me washing uniforms and polishing armor for your men, now."

"Ah, yes, yes." He nodded, his dark eyes wandering around the room. They darted back without warning to look into hers—his were so unlike Durza's. Her heart nearly stopped beating in her chest as he said, "I wondered if you'd be interested in taking the rest of the evening off and spending some time here."

"Excuse me?" She took a step back, trying to regain control of herself. What had come over her? There was a pleasant aroma in the air: jasmine and summer herbs, sandalwood and fresh pine…a touch of rare spice she didn't recognize. What was…? It was stronger the closer she was to the king, but that was…what was happening? This was definitely _not _her.

She took another step back. Her thoughts ran back to his hair, those _eyes_…there was something about that scent in the room that was so appealing…it gripped her with fierce claws and dug in with metal spikes, denying her any leverage. It whispered to her in a faint voice, imploring her…

"Are you asking me to—?"

"A simple yes or no would suffice, Diana," he snapped. Then he looked at her for a very long moment. Surely he knew the effect he was having on her; this was probably his doing, too, to call her in here, and then have whatever it was permeating the room…The aroma made it difficult to focus. It would be the most degrading thing, wouldn't it, to strip her of all her dignity and confidence and self-wroth in one fell swoop. She wouldn't allow it. She wouldn't!

But her feet moved a step forward. She knew what the scent was telling her to want, but she refused to want it. It wasn't her in control. _Come closer,_ the voice whispered. _Everything will be fine…You know it's what you really want…_

But it _wasn't_ what she really wanted. It was him, it was Galbatorix—_he_ was doing this with his magic, with _something_ that smelled to beautiful…He wanted to ruin her, and he knew just the way. This was not her, this was him. He sat in his chair and watched her internal struggle become external; she fought to keep her arms down, to keep her legs from propelling her toward him. She bit her lip and shook her head no over and over…but she couldn't stop herself, couldn't resist.

And slowly she made her way over to the king, who raised a brow as she slid her hands over his shoulders. The corners of his moth twitched into a victorious smile. Inside of her head, Clover was punching and kicking and flailing and screaming, no, no, she didn't want this, this wasn't her, she wasn't in control and she was being tricked and there was magic, magic in the air, magic in…

But oh, how good it felt to kiss him, how completely wonderful!

_It _is_ wonderful,_ she heard silent whispers. _The most wonderful thing…_

But no, this was him, this was him trying to hurt her, trying to punish her because he had allowed her too much freedom, because she had rebelled in the first place…he hated her, and this was the worst kind of revenge. This was how he was going to destroy her.

A shower of pine washed like waves on a beach through the air, and then a fresh sprig of cinnamon and lilac…

Why had she gone to see him when he had called? Because she was a castle servant now, no better than a maid folding laundry and setting plates and making dinner. Because she was, deep inside of her, scared of what he would do to her if she did not comply, just as she was mortified now by what he was trying to make her do. This was beyond terrible; he had tread over the line and gone too far. This was not the way to settle things. Clover wanted to vomit.

Lavender and cloves and honey and rosewater, sandalwood and pine and everything wonderful…the smells became infinite as she kissed him a second time. She could feel the muscles below his shoulders and down his arms and through his shirt. There was nature everywhere, and she thought of home and the fields and the flowers…this was everything she had ever loved combined into one glorious aroma that she couldn't bring herself to let go of. She just…

Home. That was it!

She pushed the memories of her home, of the swaying wheat fields and the icy brooks near the valley into her mind. She dragged up holding hands with her youngest sister and twisting blades of grass together, of starting a fire in the hearth before she put them to bed.

And she found the strength to wrench herself away from the king, despite the chorus of roaring whispers mixing with the gorgeous aroma around her. "You're sick," she hissed, and then she was gone.

She scrubbed her body clean of everything that smelled beautiful, and winced when she pressed to too hard on the bruise on her calf. What on earth had Galbatorix done to put those thoughts in her head? Why would he have gone so far to humiliate and degrade her, to snuff out who she was? This was beyond anything he could have done, _anything_. She wished he would have just killed her. At least then she would have died with at least an ounce of dignity.

Sleeping with the enemy, or seducing the enemy with the aid of magic—lots and lots of magic. She had to give him at least a sliver of credit…defiling something that could not be given back. Not a scar or a bruise, far worse than any external wound. She shivered. How could she not have seen something like that coming?

She rubbed a wet cloth across her lips for the umpteenth time. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't seem to get the taste of him off of her. Her stomach bubbled, and within seconds, her mouth tasted like rancid milk; she found a bucket just as the bile swam up. After vomiting, she pulled a nightgown she had borrowed from Mira over her head and went to bed clutching the gold chain.


End file.
